Welcome to Part Three of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to turn a site into an automated traffic machine using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this article series, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress site is the key to automating traffic to your site …
(With an expertly configured WordPress site, all you have to do is post great content on a regular basis to start driving web traffic!)
In Part Two, we focused on critical setup decisions. We explained the best way to get started if you don’t have a website yet, how to set everything up if you already have a website, and what to do if your existing site was built using WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up WordPress on your domain)
In this section, we will discuss the configuration stage of this process. You will learn how to configure a WordPress site so you can automatically get new traffic simply by posting content on a regular basis to your site.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint – Configuration
Being able to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by website owners as the greatest challenge they face online. Businesses are becoming so much more competitive and are researching any and every advantage they can to get better results online.
Being able to automatically generate traffic on demand is a tremendous advantage over the competition. Having an expertly configured website gives you a flying start and a significant advantage online.
Configuration Is The Difference
There is a difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a website that has been professionally installed and set up by an expert website developer but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress can offer.
Here’s one way to describe the main difference:
With a WordPress website that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence with online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence with an automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only does it take more labor to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, it also takes a special kind of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with an amusing little story.
Knowing Where To Tap
All was going fine in the gizmo-making assembly line when everything came to a sudden stop.
No one could figure out what went wrong and so the plant manager decided to call in an expert to fix the problem.
Promptly after arriving, the expert immediately went to the control box. After staring silently at the wiring board for what seemed like about 5 minutes or less, the expert then produced a tiny hammer from his tool box and made a single tap about three inches from the left side of the unit.
Immediately, everything started working again.
The plant manager was overjoyed as he thanked the expert, who left as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days later, the factory manager received a bill for $5,000.
The factory manager called the expert, demanding to know why they were expected to pay so much for less than five minutes work and promptly requested an itemized invoice before hanging up.
The next day, a bill of payment arrived in the manager’s in-tray. Upon opening it, this is what he saw:
The number one challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive traffic to their sites.
In the story we’ve just described, how much money did the widget plant stand to lose when production ground to a halt and no one on the factory floor had the expertise required to get things up and running again? Did the expert not have the right to demand fair compensation for having invested years building up the knowledge and expertise that allowed him to immediately avert a crisis?
Similarly, if you could have your WordPress website or blog set up so all you have to do is publish new content and search engines, social networking sites and dozens of other web properties would be immediately notified, how much time and money would this save you?
(How much time and money would you save if you could automate the process of driving traffic to your website?)
While many experts often make complex things look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site is more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few internal settings. It involves knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things such as:
- Which programs you need to install to get desired functionalities on your site.
- Which 3rd-party services need to be set up to get certain outcomes
- Which internal and external settings need to be configured in order to make sure processes will work as envisioned, etc.
(Driving web traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
Although this part of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem technically challenging, it can be quite involved and complicated. This is because it’s not as simple as installing and configuring a plugin, configuring some options and settings in your admin area or clicking a button … it’s all this and much more.
Expertly configuring your website involves the integration of a number of different components including your server, your website, and a number of third-party sites and/or online services …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring some settings in WordPress)
If we were to create a simple flowchart showing the steps involved in the configuration process, it would look like this …
(A simplistic diagram showing the steps involved in the configuration process)
Let’s take a look at these steps.
Configuring Your Web Server
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your hosting account for website installation purposes. We’re talking about fine-tuning settings and options in your web-hosting account that affect how your site will handle all web traffic …
(In the configuration stage, your server settings need to be fine-tuned for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is beneficial traffic. Some of the traffic your site may attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, malicious threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This part of the configuration process, therefore, requires evaluating your needs, planning for good and bad traffic and adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like implementing spam protection and preventing security threats, to configuring your domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your webhosting settings for handling things like emails, page errors, etc?)
After your web server settings have been fine-tuned and configured, the next step of the configuration phase is to set up various external sites or online services.
Integration With External Accounts
The basic concept of adding external sites is that all of your content will be posted to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will get distributed automatically to other components of your web traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
After incorporating these external platforms into your setup, content with links pointing back to your site gets automatically published on these platforms, indexed by search engines and shared to other social networks, even to users of the platform itself. Your content will be exposed to new audiences and new sources of traffic.
Some of the sites will need to be set up before configuring your site to help save time and some will need to be done later, during the automation phase.
For example, here are just some of the accounts you will need to have set up:
Google Webmaster Tools
(Google Webmaster Tools)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides site owners with a range of useful information, SEO tools, and diagnostic reports about their website.
After setting up your account and entering site details with Google, you can use this information with web traffic settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your site’s performance, SEO, user engagement, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine referrals, etc.
After setting up your account and site details, visitor tracking data can be integrated with WordPress via a simple plugin and automatically fed to other useful applications and reporting tools.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmasters. Once your account is with Bing are set up, use the details with traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part Two, WordPress offers both a hosted and a self-hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress version if you are planning to build a professional business presence online.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides a number of useful features, which various WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate these features into your automated traffic generation system in the next installment of this series.
Social Media Accounts
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and attract new traffic to your site)
You will need to have already set up your social media and social bookmarking accounts before you can integrate these with your traffic generation system.
Once you have set up and configured everything, you will be able to syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and get new visitors to your site.
Make sure you have set up accounts with all of the big social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.
There are lots of social sites you can set up accounts with. You don’t need to go crazy, just choose those that will work with your system and/or content syndication tools.
(You can post your content to lots of social bookmarking sites. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Solutions, Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging technology platforms and content aggregators that can serve as secondary-level traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free levels, and some offer a range of pricing plans to suit different users.
For example, here is a content aggregator that lets you add your WordPress blog feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Publishing platform for distributed content)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content is displayed in a Pinterest-like format and users can follow your page.
There are many different technologies and third-party applications you can add to your own traffic blueprint. Please contact us if you would like to explore some of these and discuss a strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your server settings and set up third-party service accounts, it’s time to configure your WordPress settings.
WordPress – Configuring Your Site For Traffic
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that your global settings have been correctly set up.
Let’s go over some of the important areas.
Configuring WordPress Settings
Your WordPress administration area contains a Settings section that allows you to modify your site’s main settings …
(WordPress menu – Settings)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can affect your site’s SEO, search results, etc …
(Settings Menu – General Settings)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings section contains a powerful and often overlooked built-in traffic notification system …
(Settings Menu – Writing Settings)
As described in the Update Services section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have intentionally chosen to discourage search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically notify the update services entered into the Update Services text area
By default, when WordPress is installed, only one service is available …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature Of WordPress)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically …
(Notify dozens of update services automatically!)
Download A Comprehensive List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site!
Click the link below to download a comprehensive list of reliable and authoritative ping services for your WordPress site or blog:
Download A List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site
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Note: If you need help setting up the list of ping services on your site, we recommend using a professional web services provider. You can find professional WordPress service providers in our WordPress Services Directory.
Reading Settings
This section affects how visitors will see your content when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings in this section can have an influence traffic. For example, choosing to display the full content vs summaries of your post, affects how your content shows up in RSS readers and blog post digests, and could impact someone’s decision to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your website to read the rest of the content from summaries, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
The most important setting in this section as far as traffic is concerned is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is enabled or not.
Normally, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked enables WordPress to instantly notify all the update services you have listed in the Update Services field when a new post is published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, leave this box unchecked …
(Settings Menu – Reading Settings)
Discussion
Although discussion settings are mostly concerned with how users engage with content on your site, you have the option to allow notifications to blogs linked to from your posts, and to allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks). This can work for you, but it can also drive bad traffic in the form of SPAM comments …
(Global Settings – Discussion Settings)
Permalinks
Permalinks allow you to display posts with SEO-friendly URLs …
(WordPress Settings – Permalink Settings)
Here are some of the ways your permalink URLs can be configured …
(Configuring search-friendly URLS)
For a detailed tutorial about setting up WP permalinks, go here: Setting Up Your WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Traffic Plugins
WordPress provides users with thousands of plugins that help to add just about every kind of functionality imaginable to your website, including plugins that add traffic generation capabilities.
Let’s take a brief look at some types of plugin categories that affect traffic and plugin examples
WordPress Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your website for dealing with both good traffic and bad traffic. Regardless of the kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, securing your website or blog is something you cannot afford to ignore.
(Security Plugins stop bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your website invisible to botnet and hacker attacks.
To learn more, go here:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by making your website more search engine friendly …
(WP Plugin – Yoast SEO)
Use a plugin like Yoast SEO to improve your site’s SEO. When properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your web pages easier for search engines like Google to find, classify and index, it allows you to configure how your content will show up in Google’s search results and social media sites Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing your visitors to share your content online can help boost traffic to your site, especially if your site provides great content that adds value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their website with WordPress plugins)
You can easily add social sharing features to your website with free or inexpensive plugins.
Most social plugins let you select which sites your content can be shared to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom post messages, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of shares), etc. Some social sharing plugins even allow you to set up protected content areas on your site which visitors can unlock by sharing your page.
Configuring WordPress Theme Settings For Traffic Generation
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help you drive more traffic to your site.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your site, some themes also provide built-in options for improving SEO and site linking structure for better indexing, add analytics snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes can be configured for improved traffic results)
With a number of quality themes, adding social sharing features to your site is as easy as clicking a couple of buttons and enabling the function …
(Many WordPress themes provide users with built-in social sharing features that can be easily enabled on with the click of a button)
Configuring Additional WordPress Areas
Last (but by no means least) in the WordPress traffic configuration process, are the components that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
This includes the following:
Compliance Web Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for a growth in traffic numbers, it’s important to plan not only for both good and unwelcome traffic but also for all the situations that can damage your business as more and more people begin to visit your website.
If you engage in any form of business online (or are planning to), it’s important that your site is compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With All Legal Requirements?)
For a detailed article on the importance of having a compliant website, go here:
Post Categories & Tags
Tags and categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better organize and index your website.
(WordPress post categories help improve traffic by improving your site’s SEO.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, it’s best to set up your website’s tags and categories earlier on, during the Website Planning Stage.
When considering ways to automate and improve traffic, you will want to review and make sure that your site’s post categories and tags have been correctly set up to deliver optimal results.
Site Map
A site map that displays all of your posts and pages to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover your website content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for traffic too!)
An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same things. Only search engines can understand XML sitemaps. Although search engines like Google can index your pages just using an XML sitemap (which plugins like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), making it easier for visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
Don’t Forget Your 404 Page Not Found
When visitors searching for your site type in the wrong web address into their browser or click on a hyperlink pointing to a page on your site that no longer exists, they are greeted with a 404 error page …
(A 404 Page)
A 404 Not Found page can redirect confused visitors to your functional web pages …
(Configuring your 404 page allows you to recover web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 Not Found page can be set up in your server, there are several WordPress plugins that allow you to easily configure your 404 page from your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Automation Blueprint: Configuration Stage – Summary
Once you have your website fully set up and expertly configured, all you have to do then is post fresh content consistently to automatically begin attracting new traffic.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate , requiring the configuration and integration of various elements and web properties …
(WordPress Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The kind of skills and knowledge involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take some web developers a long time to acquire.
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate as much of the process as can be automated. This step is explained in the next article in our series.
This is the end of Section 3
To read the rest of this article, click on the link below:
This tutorial is part of an tutorial series aimed at helping site owners learn how to grow their business and drive traffic sustainably using a WordPress website or blog and proven online marketing strategies.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum
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